[The latest news is that these folks seem to be closed now.] My focus at OYB, especially for restaurants, is to call out highlights out of town. Hinterlands hotspots. Because my idea is that the cities can take care of themselves. People still know how to be civilized downtown. But when folks are on the road the bottom drops out. You’ve got your freeway exit chain stops and…what? There aren’t any great guidebooks left. It’s all piecemeal.
Well, this example is a mixed-breed. It’s only 20 minutes from Chicago, in Hammond, IN, but it might as well be the sticks. How many from the big city know about it anymore?
Phil Smidt’s. For perch and froglegs. That’s the ticket.
It’s an oldfashioned place that’s been around for almost 90 years, I think. It moved from the original place but it’s still a classy venue with tall ceilings.
Astonishingly, there’s no good pic of it online, either. But they were on a Line poster, so that’ll do.
I ordered my perch bone-in. I think they’re a little cheaper that way. More like when you catch them yourself. Small fish backbones lift out so easily. But whatever.
Try the froglegs, too.
C’mon, what other classic restaurant features these two items?
None!
(OK, one, Teibel’s, and I guess it’s nearby, too, in Schererville. And some say it’s better.)
I think Phil Smidt’s does get listed in America’s best restaurants lists. Well, we saw a placemat once with one from every state sketched onto a map and Phil Smidt’s was Indiana’s, right on Lake Michigan proudly butted up against the best of Chicago. Indiana could’ve given itself some space and picked something from Indy, but no.
Try Phil’s the next time you’re driving that way. Then write it up in the Local Spirit listing for Indiana—easy to get to from the OYB homepage. Go to the OYB Forums. Or even LocalSpirit.org.
Now, like most of these kinds of places the word is that “it’s not like it used to be” but I still say you tend to get far more in the whole package than you get in new places. And why have they declined anyway? Because out-of-towners don’t support the indy spirit like they should? Don’t inspire the grandkids to take up the cause with verve? (Usually when we come across 100-year-old shops they’re run by 80-year-olds who say none of their relatives have any interest and the bulldozer will soon flatten their handcrafted shops of our culture’s highest achievement.)
Of course the best perch have to be the ones you catch yourself. And it’s not even very hard and most places in the midwest are close to perch. Tasty! Winter or summer, perch are there to please.
Frogs are a little harder to sort out but really not—they’re great for summertime sporting fun where it’s hot and humid—all you need is a pond, a boat, a long pole (15-20 feet), short line, hook and snip of red hanky. Then use your ears and have patience. Or, better yet, go out at night on a pond in a boat. I think you need to use a light with red plastic taped over it—then shine the banks and look for eyes. But frogging is a little crazy. Yet many, many country folk do it, so it’s not. But still…
https://www.philsmidts.com/
